Unlike feds, California ahead of forecasts on Obamacare signups

By Russ Britt

While the overall effort to enlist consumers in the Obamacare program is falling short of expectations, it seems California’s participation in the program is exceeding forecasts by a wide margin.

Covered California website

State officials said Thursday that its Covered California health exchange signed up more than 880,000 consumers by the end of February, well ahead of the base forecast of 560,000 projected for the full six months of open enrollment, which is due to end March 31.

Translated, it means California is responsible for more than one-fifth of the 4.2 million registered via exchanges throughout the nation that were set up under the Affordable Care Act. California has the strongest participation by far, with Florida, which decided to use the federal HealthCare.gov exchange rather than set up its own, a distant second at roughly half the enrollees as that of the Golden State.

Covered California Executive Director Peter V. Lee said in a conference call with reporters that another 40,000 enrolled for coverage in the first nine days of March, putting the state’s effort on track to double forecasts. Lee said the agency has 1.6 million applicants deemed eligible for coverage but it is unclear how many will receive subsidies, or who will go elsewhere to seek coverage if no assistance is available to them.

Meanwhile, the federal effort is struggling to meet lowered expectations. After HealthCare.gov’s botched debut, the Congressional Budget Office lowered its forecast of total nationwide enrollment to 6 million from 7 million. At least one industry watcher is projecting it will be difficult to reach that mark, and likely will fall short and conclude the March 31 deadline with about 5.4 million signups.

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